I can't think of a president who has been overburdened by a knowledge of economics.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that having extensive knowledge of economics can be more of a burden than a benefit for a president.
In this quote, Paul Samuelson reflects on the idea that presidents often face complex and challenging economic decisions, and that being well-versed in economics can complicate their decision-making process. The implication is that a lack of deep economic knowledge might sometimes enable leaders to make decisions without being overwhelmed by the complexities that such knowledge entails.
In practice
In a political debate discussing the role of economic advisors in presidential decision-making.
To a person of analytical ability, perceptive enough to realise that mathematical equipment was a powerful sword in economics, the world of economics was his or her oyster in 1935. The terrain was strewn with beautiful theorems begging to be picked up and arranged in unified order.
My belief is that nothing that can be expressed by mathematics cannot be expressed by careful use of literary words.
Politicians like to tell people what they want to hear - and what they want to hear is what won't happen.
My family was well off but not rich. I spent the four years I was an undergraduate working on the beach. And it wasn't because I was lazy; it was because my freshman class would go to a hundred different employers and wouldn't get a nibble. That was a disequilibrium system. I realized that the ordinary old-fashioned Euclidean geometry didn't apply.
Economics has never been a science - and it is even less now than a few years ago.
There's nothing in Keynesian economics that would allow you to solve stagflation. But there's nothing in neoclassical economics that would allow you to solve stagflation, either.
What we have ignored is what citizens can do and the importance of real involvement of the people involved - versus just having somebody in Washington make a rule.
Brexit is the other face of the refugee crisis - tensions that lead to stasis, external risks that lead to asymmetric shocks.
We won't organize any black man to be a Democrat or a Republican because both of them have sold us out. Both of them have sold us out; both parties have sold us out. Both parties are racist, and the Democratic Party is more racist than the Republican Party.
We can't get to the $4 trillion in savings that we need by just cutting the 12 percent of the budget that pays for things like medical research and education funding and food inspectors and the weather service. And we can't just do it by making seniors pay more for Medicare.
The vote controls everything that you do.
When Paris sneezes, Europe catches a cold.
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